The present invention relates to a clamp for a tank circuit of a voltage controlled oscillator which places the tank circuit in a known state on start up and also controls the stopping of the oscillation.
In applications where a voltage controlled multivibrator is not feasible the usual alternative is to use a tank type voltage controlled oscillator having a coil and capacitor. On the one hand the relatively large electrical inertia of the coil and capacitor (LC) makes an LC tank circuit less susceptable to noise on its frequency generating input(s), which almost always have to be externally connected. On the other hand where it is important to be able to stop the oscillator and then start it from a known state, the large inertia of the LC circuit makes the latter difficult.